In this chapter, Lin, and only Lin, feels fear. Oh dear. It appears we have our canary in the coal mine. In other news, the team finally gets a clue.

.o0o.

Once everyone was present, that was, Ayako, John, Lin, Monk, and Mai, Naru began his debrief.

"Here's what we know. The ghost looks in on patients, maintaining eye contact until broken or if it is scared away. If cornered, it can and will fight back, with strategies similar to that of a feral animal. Its demeanor toward staff is hostile and wary, according to anecdotal accounts. Staff have seen it out of the corner of their eyes, and it vanishes if they try to look at it directly. To the best of our knowledge, it has never entered hospital grounds. It knows what a camera is and how to avoid it. It doesn't show up on regular security footage, and it hid from our specialized cameras."

John raised a hand. "What about traffic cameras?"

"We don't have the ability to secure that footage," Naru said. "We also don't know how may spirits there are. Now, Mai had a dream last night with an unknown amount of relevance to our current case. You have all been informed of the contents of those dreams."

John sent a sympathetic glance at Mai. Mai didn't respond.

"The most useful information she gathered was that the spirit is somehow related to underground. Is that right, Mai?"

Mai nodded. "When I asked, Gene just pointed to the ground and walked down an invisible set of stairs."

Naru turned to Ayako. "What's below ground?"

"Lots of things. Operating rooms. Frozen storage. Labs. Morgues."

"Could the ghost be from a cadaver?" Takigawa offered. "That might explain why it behaves so differently between staff and patient."

Ayako frowned. "I don't think so. In my rounds that I did before you all came, I purified the cadavers. I didn't sense any lingering spirits."

"You're trying to prove a negative," Naru said. He turned to John. "Would you be able to purify them?"

John nodded. "Well, of course. But I'd have to sprinkle water on them."

Ayako shook her head. "That wouldn't be allowed. Protocol for doing anything to a cadaver is tight."

Naru sighed. "I thought so. Would we by chance have access to the room, without doing anything to the cadavers? If the spirits are there, Monk should be able to purify them."

Ayako huffed again. She was trying her best not to be offended that Naru wanted to redo the work she said she had done. "It's possible, but it will be tricky. Likely we'll be monitored by someone else, and if they don't like what we're doing, they'll have security take us out."

Monk let out a groan. "Does anyone else feel like we're playing politicians right now instead of ghost hunters? This case has more obstruction than congress."

"Take it up with the board," Ayako said. "But just do me a favor and don't drag me into it. I've already dealt with tantrums from both sides."

"If the ghost truly is a cadaver," said John. "Then the ghost is making a journey from hospital campus to off-campus. And based on what you told me about last night, the ghost ran away from the hospital, not towards."

Naru nodded. "If the ghost is a cadaver, then yes, your recount of events would be plausible." He thought for a moment. "Miss Matsuzaki, I want a list of every patient who has reported a sighting, where they were when they saw it, and what they were doing if they can at all remember."

Ayako nodded. "That will take me some time."

"We're pulling straws right now. We need to see if there are patterns. And can we get into the cadaver rooms while we wait?"

"I'll have to call Dr. Fujimoto and have all this cleared."

"Please do that."

It took Ayako twenty minutes to negotiate with Dr. Fujimoto. There was bargaining, yelling (from the administrative side; even now Ayako wouldn't yell at her boss), explaining, and obstructive limits set, but in the end, Ayako got permission for Takigawa, Lin, and John to go down to the cadaver rooms and touch nothing, don't even breathe, and for herself to gather information from patients, but only if she said that an investigative team needed the information. She was not allowed to say paranormal researchers. In hindsight, that made sense, as investigation team sounded more authoritative than a rag-tag bunch of ghost hunters.

When Ayako finally hung up, she melted into a chair with a long, drawn out sigh.

"That sounded awful," John said.

"Yeah," said the Miko. Not a moment later, she sprung up. "Well, I should get going."

"What about breakfast?" Mai asked.

"You know where the cafeteria is. But you three," Ayako gestured to Lin, Monk, and John, "are expected in the cadaver rooms at ten o'clock."

"Right," John said, accompanied by Lin's nod.

"So let's get a quick breakfast and go," said Monk.

Mai raised a hand. "Do you still want me to play patient?"

Naru thought. "I don't think that would be beneficial," he said. "We've seen what we need to see. Unless we need to lure out the spirit, I don't think it would be worth the time." Or the money went unsaid. Which was still ridiculous—someone needed to get the board and the hospital administrators on the same page. "Miss Matsuzaki?"

"On it," Ayako said, dialing Dr. Fujimoto one last time.

"What?" came the bark from the other side.

"We're finished using the inpatient room."

"You never should have had it in the first place."

Click!

"And screw you too," Ayako muttered. "Room's gone. If we need another one—"

"One of us will walk into traffic blindfolded," Naru said so dryly that the sarcasm was easily missed.

And with that, the team had a quick breakfast in the cafeteria before splitting up the group to do their separate tasks. Ayako simply grabbed and went, as in her case, it was better to be done as fast as possible so as not to incur more wrath from the rest of the hospital. Mai and Naru went back to watch the base, while the leftover trio went down to the cadaver rooms, escorted by a med student who clearly didn't get enough sleep last night.

Lin was tasked with holding the small camcorder. Monk, in his traditional garb, stood in front of the wall of sterile tombs. John was ready as backup, just in case things went south. Monk began his chanting.

"Sense anything?" John asked Lin.

Lin took a moment to check with his shiki. He shook his head.

"This feels like a normal room to me," said the priest.

Lin concurred—it felt like a waste of time. Nothing was showing up on the camera, and his shiki were quiet. He still hadn't heard a thing from the other two, which worried him more and more. Wood and Water's second patrol was cut short, and they hadn't noticed anything strange in what little time they did have to investigate.

Monk made it through his chant without incident. Nothing about the room changed. The three of them looked around, trying to sense anything, anything that proved that this wasn't for nothing, besides proving a negative. Once it was clear that that was exactly what happened, Lin made a note for the recording.

"Time, ten fifteen. No activity to report, before or after exorcism."

He kept the camera running as they exited the lab. There was the exhausted and cranky med student waiting for them.

"Are you done yet?" he grumbled.

"We're done," Monk said.

"Sorry to keep you up," offered John.

"Yeah, whatever. I'll take you back to the lobby, and then I'm outta here."

Fair enough. And that's what he did. As soon as they were back on floor one, near the front exit, the med student slipped away without a second thought. The three men shuffled out of the way of patients coming in and going out. The blast of air from the side doors constantly opening and closing was an uncomfortable reminder that they were remarkably out of place here.

"Now what?" Monk asked.

"Take this and go back to base," said Lin, handing Monk the camera.

"What are you going to do?"

"I'm going to go back to where we saw the apparition last night. It is likely that's what Naru will have you do next anyway."

"You shouldn't go alone," Monk said.

"I'll go with him," said John.

"I'll go with him," countered Monk. John stared at him with a tilted head. "If something happens where one of us is incapacitated, at least I have a chance of getting him out of there."

It was a logical assessment. But the power of a priest wasn't to be underestimated. John's holy water was stronger and more accessible in a pinch, whereas Monk's chanting had to be finished before he could do much.

"One of you should decide, but I'm going," Lin said, making for the door.

Monk and John exchanged glances.

"I'll go. If something happens back at base, the others will need you," John reasoned. He then ran after Lin, leaving a hesitant Monk holding the camera.

John followed Lin to the outskirts of campus. He was surprised that they were going out so far. When Ayako said the ghost didn't come on campus, she meant it literally. They were close to the park now. Turning back, John could see the tall-ish building where the inpatients were roomed. The way they were oriented, that was the closest hospital building to them. The others were substantially farther back.

"Do you think," John said with a slight pant (Lin's pace was a little fast for him), "That the ghost circles the hospital campus like this? It's a lot of ground to cover."

"I would imagine that's why Naru wanted Ms. Matsuzaki to gather the extra information. If it turns out that only parts of campus have been observed, then that will narrow our search."

Despite walking for some time at this pace, Lin didn't sound out of breath at all.

"How do you know where we're going?" John asked.

"My shiki," Lin replied.

Lin led John for a few more minutes, stopping by a lattice fence that was painted black. Something like that would have been nearly invisible at night. His shiki directed his attention to a large tree nearby, and sure enough, that was the same tree that the ghost had hid behind. Upon closer look, Lin saw that the tree was actually split down the middle. A gaping, hollow gullet was visible from the back. He and John walked around it, stopping at the slice in the back. Lin pulled out a flashlight. The tree's insides were filled with nothing but candy wrappers, cigarettes, and a crushed soda can. How utterly charming.

With a tilt of his head, he directed his Wood shiki to investigate the tree in its entirety.

"It's just a normal tree, boss," Wood reported. "It's kinda grumpy though. Doesn't like being used as a trash can, or being woken up in the middle of a nap."

"Figures. Inquire as to what it saw last night," Lin ordered.

Wood turned back to the tree and knocked on it, like a door. There was a beat before both it and Lin felt a tiny thwack on their foreheads. Wood leaped back in surprise. "I just got thumped! Wow, that really is a grumpy tree."

Well. Ayako did say that she had used the trees' energy to perform a ritual recently. She also said something about not using the tree for a long time afterwards, to let it rest. Lin assumed that perhaps this tree was one of them. Lin turned his attention to his Water shiki. "Can you investigate below ground?"

Water would have blushed if it could have. "M-me? That's Earthling's thing. I don't really do ground inspections. I'm not good at that kind of thing."

"I know," replied Lin. "But Earth and Metal aren't here. You two are the best I have."

"Um… I can tell you about the moisture paths downward…"

"And any spiritual activity you sense."

At that, Water perked up. "Oooh, yes, that I can do." And it dove underground. It was less like a dolphin gracefully submerging into the depths, and more like watching a fat groundhog try to squeeze into a rathole. Wood snorted, trying to stifle a laugh. Fire, despite its grievous injury, was still spunk enough to scold it for its unprofessional attitude.

Lin glanced toward Fire. It was still wrapped around his neck, but an absolutely massive chunk had been ripped out of its middle. The apparition had lunged at it with its teeth, crunching it up and tearing a huge segment of essence from its tiny body. What Lin didn't want to say around Mai was that it was as though the apparition was trying to devour his Fire shiki. It certainly felt that way. Naturally, he had told Naru about it once they were alone, only to receive a less than sympathetic response.

["During the retaliation, the ghost attempted to eat my shiki."

"That's unusual."]

Lin shook his head. Naru was behaving more emotionally constipated than usual. It was true that Lin rarely got hurt on cases, so Naru was unused to that kind of thing happening and could be forgiven for being on edge. Still, the tension the boy was carrying was going to snap, and whoever was on the other end of that taut string wasn't going to be very happy about it.

Water returned. "I got nothing, boss," it said.

Lin clicked his tongue. This case was full of nothing but dead ends and loose threads. He addressed his Fire shiki.

"How far did you get before you lost the target?"

Fire extended its neck. "We made it quite a ways that way."

"How did you defend yourself?"

"I shot Fire energy into its face. It let me go after that."

"It tore a chunk out of you."

Fire paused. "It clenched its jaw instead of opening it."

Wood shrugged. "Could'a gone either way, really. I just hope it chokes on the part of you it did take."

Fire shot Wood a funny face.

"Yeah yeah yeah, ghosts can't choke. Whatever. I still hope it chokes. Ya' hear that? I hope you choke!"

Lin tolerated the bantering. He knew they did it to keep the air light between them. He hadn't checked in on them about Earth and Metal, but he was sure they were at the very least unnerved.

"Please direct the way," Lin said, interrupting Wood.

Fire nodded. It craned its neck in the direction it wanted. Lin began walking. John reminded Lin of his presence by exclaiming, "Wait! Where are you going?"

"Back to where my shiki chased the apparition," explained Lin.

He heard John let out something of an exhausted huff. He didn't like that he was giving the priest a hard time, but there wasn't time to waste, especially with how much ground Fire was having them cover.

It was only after fifteen minutes of brisk walking that Fire stopped them at a four-lane road. "Stop here," it said, which Lin did. John, huffing and puffing, smacked into him from behind. Lin turned around. The priest hunched over, balancing with his hands on his knees.

"How—" (Pant) "Much farther" (pant) "Are we going?" he asked.

"It stopped here," Lin said, only now feeling a twinge of guilt for dragging him all the way out here. Takigawa would have been able to keep up. Naru would have called it quits ages ago.

John sat down in the grass. "I need a minute."

Lin nodded. He stayed standing and scanned the area. Behind them was the park. There was a large sign reading Welcome to Amnity Park. A pavement path with benches along its side clearly marked the border. Indeed, they had walked across the whole thing, making Lin feel even worse for John. Off in the distance however, across a busy road and a metal highway barrier was that stand of trees. Once he saw the trees, he couldn't stop seeing them. It was visually unremarkable, but something about it spoke deep dark to him, and it ate away at his sense of safety.

He hadn't realized he was staring at the trees until John spoke up. "What do you see?"

Lin tore his eyes away from the long grasses and the darkness in the distance. He looked down at John, still seated in the grass. He sent an order to his Wood shiki. "Investigate the nearest tree."

Wood slithered forward, and then it stopped. "Uh, boss, I got a funny feeling. Not like funny ha-ha, but the bad kind of funny. Ooh, I'm getting a bit queasy."

Fire sent Wood a stern look. "Spirits can't—"

"Well I am!" Wood barked. Fire's eyes widened. It was rare for any of the shiki to snap back at it like that. As Lin's first, it had seniority. "Boss, what do you think?"

Lin turned back to the stand of trees. He did not feel the queasiness that Wood was feeling. He did feel the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. John stood up next to him, looking at him quizzically before staring back into the woods.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

"When you look at the trees, what do you sense?" Lin asked.

John stared at the woods. "They're woods. Probably not safe to go into. Ticks. Animals. Sudden drops."

Lin tore his eyes away from the trees again to look at John. Did the priest not feel the tiny twinge of dread that Lin felt, nipping at the base of his neck? "I get a sense of unease," he said, the rest of his question clear.

John shook his head. "I… Sorry, I don't sense it."

Lin looked back at the trees, checking one last time to make sure the feeling was still there. At least, that's what he thought he was doing. In retrospect, he just didn't want to turn his back to the woods.

"Oh, uh, Lin. Your phone is buzzing," said John.

Was it? Lin fished for his phone in his jacket pocket. Sure enough, it was buzzing quietly. And apparently, he had missed six calls from Naru. Crap. He put the phone to his ear.

"Hello?"

"Where the hell are you?" came Naru's all but frantic voice, in English no less.

"On the other side of the park. I went to investigate the location of the sighting."

Lin noticed out of his peripheral vision that John's eyebrows had raised upon hearing the sudden language shift. And then Lin remembered that John was Australian, so he too was a native English speaker. So much for privacy.

"Why didn't you pick up?" Naru demanded.

"It was unintentional. I didn't hear—"

"You were following a lead and didn't call me. You could have been—" The boy stopped. Lin waited patiently. He wondered absently if Naru was alone at base. An outburst like this was unusual for him, and not something he did in the company of most. Naru then returned to Japanese. "Come back to base. We have information to go over, and you shouldn't be out after dark."

"We have a ways to walk, but we'll be back, within an hour."

"See that you are."

The phone hung up. Lin sighed. Someone would have to teach that boy proper phone etiquette. And that someone was most probably going to be Lin.

"He sounded upset," John said.

"It's my fault," Lin conceded. "I didn't call."

"You didn't hear your phone."

Lin shook his head. "Back then. Before we came out here. I didn't call him to let him know what we were going to do. Rarely do I feel the need to act alone, but when I do, I call."

"Oh," said John. "Why didn't you?"

Yes, why didn't he? Lin was the cautious one out of the two of them. It was more Naru's style to do something reckless without telling anyone. Lin could write a book on the number of risks the young man had taken without letting him know, regardless of how many times he had scolded him for it. Perhaps now Naru would understand how it felt. …No. Lin closed his eyes. That was juvenile. Naru was worried about him, agitated by the visions Mai had been having. Now was not the time to be retaliatory.

"I should have called," Lin said.

John just stared as Lin walked back toward the park.

Lin should have expected Mai to crush his insides when he got back. It was his own fault, really. Mai lunged at him as soon as he and John showed their faces, wrapping his torso in a frightfully tight hug. When did the tiny girl get so strong? Instead of pulling away, he awkwardly patted Mai's shoulder.

"I apologize for scaring you," he offered.

Mai didn't respond right away. Oh dear, he must have really frightened her. And Naru. He looked at Naru, who was staring at him with frigid eyes.

"Now that we're all here," said the boss with just as much frost. "Miss Matsuzaki can give us her report."

"We have something to report too," John said.

Naru's glare focused on John, who shrunk back. "I should hope so."

"Lay off, Naru," Takigawa interjected from the back of the group. "They're here now. Nothing happened to them."

Lin regarded the monk with surprise and then chided himself. He really should have stopped doubting the team's insight by now, even when it came to Naru. He sent a thankful nod to Takigawa. Now to take care of Mai.

"Miss Taniyama, would you please let go?"

Mai detached from his waist rather suddenly, like she had forgotten who she was hugging. "Sorry," she offered. The distance gave Lin enough space to see her worried expression. At least she wasn't crying.

"No apology necessary," Lin soothed. "You didn't have another vision, did you?"

Mai shook her head. That was a relief, for both of them. After the day he had, the last thing Lin needed was a disturbed retelling of how he had been butchered this time. All he could hope was that Mai's dreams continued to be symbolic of past events, rather than prophetic. The girl had gained a frightening amount of abilities over her time at the SPR—prophecy was not an ability any of them truly wanted her to have.

"Now that we're all here," Naru said (didn't he say that earlier?), "Miss Matsuzaki. Report."

Ayako nodded. She handed Naru several sheets of paper, which he immediately began flipping through. "I gathered reports from all of the patients I could this morning. All the patients who reported being watched were in rooms facing Amnity Park, or else exposed to windows that oversaw the park."

"And none of the staff noticed this before?" John asked.

"In case you haven't noticed, a hospital is a lot bigger than a church," Ayako said. "And it's not like hospital staff are great at talking to each other. It's already an ask for any one doctor to know everything about a single patient."

"I'm… not soothed by that statement."

"It's flawed, but it still works."

"We're not here to discuss hospital systems," Naru interrupted. Probably for the best. Ayako looked ready to start yanking on ears. "Are the staff listed here as well?"

"From the ones I could speak to, the reports lined up. Granted, their experiences were harder for them to recall concrete details, as everyone's always moving around somewhere. They did remember that the malicious force came from the park."

Naru nodded. "That's something, at least."

"Now we know that the ghosts appear to be coming from the park," Takigawa summarized. "So really, we should be set up over there?"

Ayako cocked her head and put her hands on her hips. "Be sure about that, because once I tell Dr. Fujimoto, she'll want us out of here as soon as possible."

"Hasn't she seen the ghosts around here?" Takigawa said with more than a little bite in his voice.

"If she had, it'd have to be pretty significant for her to say anything. She's more stubborn than all of us put together."

"Ms. Matsuzaki," Naru said, bringing the room's attention back to him. "It would appear that only staff who have direct contact with patients are even on this list. Have any of the administrative staff been affected directly?"

Ayako touched her chin. "Now that you mention it, no. Only nurses, surgeons, and doctors with patients have been affected."

"I assume Dr. Fujimoto is the only administrator you've asked?"

"The board confirmed together that they haven't seen ghosts."

"Did you ask them?"

"Didn't have to. They were pretty upfront about the fact that they hadn't experienced what the staff were reporting, but they just wanted it dealt with."

"What are you thinking, Naru?" Takigawa asked.

"The apparition doesn't care about the system," said Naru. "Or at least, it doesn't know how it works. It's behavior suggests a more emotionally driven motivation, rather than a strategic attack on healthcare as a whole. It's now obvious that the spirit is against doctors and nurses, though its position toward patients is still unclear."

"Maybe the spirit was a patient who died of malpractice or something," Takigawa suggested. Like torture, Lin's mind supplied. Lin froze. Where had that come from? His mind shifted back to the woods. The hairs on the back of his neck stood on end, just at the thought of those trees.

"But would the board snitch on itself like that?" asked Mai.

"If they didn't realize that ghosts could snitch, or that we'd listen, then yeah, they could do that unintentionally."

"Lin and I might be able to explain why the ghosts seem to be coming from the park," said John. Lin had once again forgotten the smaller man's presence beside him. Though he hadn't jumped, John's voice had startled him out of his own thoughts.

"Well?" Naru prompted. It appeared he was still bitter about Lin giving him the accidental silent treatment. That would be a joy to deal with later.

"On the other side of the park is a highway and a stand of trees," said Lin. He looked at Ayako for any hint of recognition on her face. She merely nodded. "There is something unsettling about them. My instincts told me not to turn my back to them."

"Spirits?" Naru asked.

Lin shook his head. "Not that I could sense. My shiki did not want to get close to the trees. When I asked why, they were not able to give a concrete answer."

"Over the phone, you said you followed your shiki to the woods," said Naru.

"I followed my shiki to the place where it had chased the apparition. We crossed the entire park."

Naru turned to Ayako. "How large is the park?"

"It's not New York Central Park, if that's what you're asking," she replied. "You could cross it easily in fifteen minutes. And I know the highway you're talking about. I've driven on it several times. The stand of trees has never stood out to me."

"I think Lin is the only one who can feel it," John said. "I didn't get any bad feeling when I looked."

"I think it's settled then," said Naru. "We'll be investigating the woods tonight."

"Tonight?" Mai exclaimed. "Why not tomorrow?"

"Yeah, when we can see," Monk added. "This is how the Blair Witch Project ended, as in: not well."

"All the spiritual activity happens at night. I want us to try and intercept that ghost in its tracks. If we can follow it back to where it came from, we might just start to get some answers."

"What about base?" Ayako asked.

Naru put a hand to his chin, thinking. "It would be best if we kept it. We don't need an inpatient room, but it would be good to keep a base of operations that is already fortified."

"And we know the ghosts don't come here," added Mai.

"We don't know that."

Everyone turned to Naru for explanation.

"All we know is that they haven't come here yet. We can't rule out a negative until we can prove it." Naru looked at Lin. "Even though two of your shiki are missing, will the fortifications still hold?"

Lin nodded. "Yes, so long as I am alive, the barrier has energy."

Takigawa made a face. "Don't say it like that, man."

How else am I supposed to say it, thought Lin, but he merely responded with a stony look.

"So what's the plan of attack, boss?" Mai asked.

"We'll need a ground team to pursue, and a small team back at base."

"You and Lin, right?"

"You and me," Naru said. "It's obvious that Lin has to be on the ground team, as he is the only one who can sense what he reported. Monk, John, Ms. Matsuzaki, go with them. Mai, you and I will watch the base."

Lin couldn't help but agree with that arrangement, even though he wasn't completely sold on the ambush-and-chase aspect of the plan. Were they ghost hunters or Scooby Doo and the Mystery Gang? But he was grateful that Naru was staying behind, for once thinking of his own safety. If they were attacked, Lin would have to protect both himself and the boy with nuclear-tier powers.

"You should all get ready," said Naru. "We move out at seven thirty."

A glance at the clock revealed that they had five hours to go. Well, that was enough time for Lin to maybe get a third of his reports done. That was the one sneaky thing about being on the ground team. There was always a mountain of computer work waiting when he got back. Welp. Nothing to do but get started. He sat down and began typing, bringing the room back to a peaceful rhythm. The rest of the team had left the room. To do what, Lin didn't bother to ask. Just being alone with his thoughts for once was refreshing. Too bad it couldn't last.